Right now I have a i5-4430 in a Silverstone "Sugo" SG13 case with a Noctua L9i cooler, a GTX 960 4GB, 16GB of DDR3 RAM, and a Silverstone SS-F520 Fanless PSU.
The Noctua L9i is about the tallest cooler my case can take. I tried a Noctua L9x65 and it was too tall by about an inch (bumps into the PSU). This system sits in an Media Center that only has 8.25" of clearance, so the SG13 case is perfect.
My problem is currently my CPU idles at about 50-55C, and during very light gaming/SNES emulation/light 2d/3d gaming the CPU hits around 75-80C, which I believe starts to cause Haswell to start thermally throttling.
I'm looking to improve my thermals at this point. My two options seem to be:
1) buy a i5-6500/mini ITX mobo/RAM combo for around $360 and sell my 4430/DDR3 RAM/Mobo for around $200, which would mean I would have a CPU that runs maybe 5-7C cooler typically at the same or better performance, so total upgrade cost would be about $160ish.
2) buy a new HTPC case with the maximum clearance I can get (maybe an 8" tall case) and use a slightly taller cooler, either the L9X65 or something else (maybe a Cryorig R1). Either way it's still going to be a low profile cooler, just possibly something 10-20mm taller (and better performing) than the L9i I'm currently use. Cost here would vary, but I'm guessing at bare minimum a 8" tall SG13 alternative case would be something like the Antec ISK600 at around $80 shipped + the cost of a slightly taller/higher performing low profile fan at around $60 = $140 upgrade cost.
So the choices are slightly cooler CPU or slightly bigger case and taller fan. Or should I not bother and just let this thing run on fumes until 10nm CPUs come out? The only thing I really do is play some console ports or emulators on this thing and watch movies.
The Noctua L9i is about the tallest cooler my case can take. I tried a Noctua L9x65 and it was too tall by about an inch (bumps into the PSU). This system sits in an Media Center that only has 8.25" of clearance, so the SG13 case is perfect.
My problem is currently my CPU idles at about 50-55C, and during very light gaming/SNES emulation/light 2d/3d gaming the CPU hits around 75-80C, which I believe starts to cause Haswell to start thermally throttling.
I'm looking to improve my thermals at this point. My two options seem to be:
1) buy a i5-6500/mini ITX mobo/RAM combo for around $360 and sell my 4430/DDR3 RAM/Mobo for around $200, which would mean I would have a CPU that runs maybe 5-7C cooler typically at the same or better performance, so total upgrade cost would be about $160ish.
2) buy a new HTPC case with the maximum clearance I can get (maybe an 8" tall case) and use a slightly taller cooler, either the L9X65 or something else (maybe a Cryorig R1). Either way it's still going to be a low profile cooler, just possibly something 10-20mm taller (and better performing) than the L9i I'm currently use. Cost here would vary, but I'm guessing at bare minimum a 8" tall SG13 alternative case would be something like the Antec ISK600 at around $80 shipped + the cost of a slightly taller/higher performing low profile fan at around $60 = $140 upgrade cost.
So the choices are slightly cooler CPU or slightly bigger case and taller fan. Or should I not bother and just let this thing run on fumes until 10nm CPUs come out? The only thing I really do is play some console ports or emulators on this thing and watch movies.
Facebook
Twitter